The Miami Dolphins and New York Jets will squeeze the last ounce out of the NFL regular season Sunday in a head-to-head showdown for the final AFC wild card berth.
Is that wild card or mild card?Whichever team wins Sunday will advance to the playoffs with not much to recommend it for the annual postseason festival of football.
If the Jets, losers of their last three games and six of their last nine, win, they would finish at 8-8 and become only the third team to qualify for the NFL playoffs by winning as many games as it lost. New Orleans was 8-8 and last year and Cleveland won the AFC Central with 8-8 in 1985. Both were first round losers. Contrast that with San Francisco and Philadelphia, both already eliminated from NFC postseason consideration even though each could wind up a more respectable 10-6.
The playoffs are like that sometimes.
Two teams - Cleveland and Detroit - made it at 4-5 in the strike season of 1982 when a Super Bowl tournament qualified 16 of the 28 teams for the playoffs. But in full seasons, except for last year's Saints and 1985's Browns, teams have always had to win more games than they lost to make it. A Jets' win Sunday would get them there because of tie-breaking formulas which would make their 8-8 better than the 8-8 the Dolphins would have should they lose that game.
If that happens, blame Miami. The Dolphins put themselves in a slippery position Sunday and kept the Jets alive by blowing a 13-point fourth-quarter lead against the lowly San Diego Chargers.
If Miami wins Sunday - entirely possible given the Jets' recent play - the Dolphins would go in at 9-7, hardly awe-inspiring but certainly good enough for a number of wild card teams over the years.
Two years ago, 9-7 qualified Houston and Pittsburgh as AFC wild cards in a season when 10-6 wasn't good enough to get Green Bay and Washington into the NFC playoffs. In 1987, Minnesota reached the NFC postseason at 8-7, but the same record left San Diego, New England, Miami and Pittsburgh all out of the AFC playoffs.
It hardly seems fair, but sometimes football is not fair.
In 1985, the New York Giants made it to the NFC playoffs at 10-6, but the same record wasn't good enough to get Washington in. Denver had a better record than either of them at 11-5, but the tiebreak formula left them out of the AFC postseason. The previous year, Pittsburgh won the AFC Central championship at 9-7, the same record that earned the Giants a ticket into the NFC postseason but left both the St. Louis Cardinals and Dallas at home for the playoffs. And in 1983, Detroit won the NFC Central at 9-7, the same record that left Cleveland out of the AFC playoffs.
How's that for fair?
Fair would be a generous description of how the Dolphins and Jets have played to reach this wild card showdown game. Consider the credentials:
- The Jets found a way to lose at home to both New England, a 1-15 team last year, and Indianapolis, a 1-14 team this year.
- Miami's loss to the Chargers marked the third time this season the Dolphins have blown a fourth-quarter lead.
It is appropriate then that the only thing at stake here is a wild card berth, hardly a ticket to postseason success.
Still, it's an extra payday for the players - no small incentive - and there is always a shot that they might win the whole thing, the way the Raiders did the year they made it.
Win the whole thing? The Jets?
The Dolphins? Those shots would be decidely long ones.